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Ira Stoll

In defense of Romney’s “gift” remarks

At least two important points are being missed in the discussion of Romney’s remarks. First, there’s a double standard at work. When reporters suggest that donors to Republican causes are motivated by self-interested desire to keep their taxes low and their businesses unhampered by environmental or labor regulations, that’s groundbreaking investigative journalism. (See, for example, The New Yorker magazine’s Jane Mayer on Charles and David Koch.) Yet when Romney suggests that Democratic voters might have been motivated by self-interest, his comments are condemned.

The second missed point is that Romney is hardly the first to suggest that voters might be swayed by the government benefits they are receiving. There’s an entire field of economics, known as public choice theory, devoted to the idea that, as the Concise Encyclopedia of Economics summarizes it, “people are guided chiefly by their own self-interests and…as such, voters ‘vote their pocketbooks,’ supporting candidates and ballot propositions they think will make them personally better off…Public choice, in other words, simply transfers the rational actor model of economic theory to the realm of politics.” …

The idea that voters might consider what’s in it for themselves, in other words, isn’t some screwball sour-grapes idea dreamt up by Mitt Romney as an excuse for his defeat. Rather, it’s been part of mainstream social science for decades.

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I know a police officer who is approaching retirement and is conservative, or right wing if you will, as they come. He voted for Obama because he somehow thought Romney “would take away his state pension benefits.”

He voted for Obama because he somehow thought Romney “would take away his state pension benefits.”

AcidReflux on November 20, 2012 at 5:13 PM

It won’t be Romney that takes away his pension, it will be the reality of economic collapse.

I had a friend who recently was employed by the SSA and voted for Obama because he was afraid Romney would cut his job. I laughed at him and told him social security will probably be entirely gone in less than ten years.

Ahh, but you are all missing the Twist in what passes for liberal logic. Obama’s not giving gifts. Gifts may or may not be deserved. Whatever Obama bestows is a benefit in the name of fairness. You see, the poor and not so poor alike deserve these benefits, because they are poor or disadvantaged in some way. In the Liberal mind, it is more noble to be poor than it is to be rich. In order to get rich, you must have exploited others, so by remaining poor, these beneficiaries are better than those selfish rich people. Therefore, in the name of Social Justice, we must redistribute.

The main ones condemning Romney’s gift remarks are RINOs running to the left for the 2016 primary. Haven’t seen too many conservatives criticize the moochers/gift hypothesis, seeing as it’s pretty standard conservative doctrine that Rush etc. have used to describe the election.

Sorry, but Reagan started it with his “Are you better off now…” That’s all about self-interest. And ideally the answer is Yes because a thriving economy has created better opportunities for your business or the business where you’re employed. But just as easily it can be answered Yes because of the “gifts” government has bestowed on you.

First, there’s a double standard at work. When reporters suggest that donors to Republican causes are motivated by self-interested desire to keep their taxes low and their businesses unhampered by environmental or labor regulations, that’s groundbreaking investigative journalism. (See, for example, The New Yorker magazine’s Jane Mayer on Charles and David Koch.) Yet when Romney suggests that Democratic voters might have been motivated by self-interest, his comments are condemned.

I think there is a double standard here, but not the one the author is referring to. All voters vote according to their policy preferences and all politicians emphasize policy positions they believe will attract voters to vote for them. When Romney campaigned in coal country, he emphasized his support for the coal industry. When Romney spoke to wealthy donors, he emphasized his support for low capital gains taxes and the carried interest loophole. When he spoke to veterans or military audiences, he promised large increases in defense spending. When he spoke to seniors, he promised never to cut their Medicare or Social Security benefits, and so on. Romney’s “gift” remarks were criticized not just because they reinforced his image as a hearless one-percenter, but because he was characterizing liberal policy preferences as “gifts” as though they were somehow different in kind from the types of promises he made to his supporters.

I like the show “Red Eye”, find Howard Stern to be entertaining in general, and am more than willing to make any and all sorts of off-color/offensive comments, but, I understand the concept of, ‘there’s a time and place…’, and am careful to not be crude nor blunt when it’s counterproductive to be. Why more people on our side don’t seem to understand this is problematic.